25 years ago today I sat in the computer lab at school while Mrs. Ryan aired the live broadcast of the Space Shuttle Challenger’s launch. Kindergartners and 1st Graders were seated in anticipation as most of our daddies and mommies had lent a hand in building the space craft. The Challenger had been towed down 10th Street East on its way to Edwards Air Force Base where it was to be place on top of an airplane and flown to Cape Canaveral, Florida.

That day in Mrs. Ryan’s class is deeply seeded in my mind. The Challenger symbolized the hope of my youth, in the US during the 1980’s we were filled with possibilities and a desire to advance. At the height of its growth and the fastest expanding city in the US, my town, the largest Aerospace community in the world, the Challenger meant progress and a job well done. It meant they were all moving in the right direction. Blue collar workers were confident in the prescribed dose of Republican bullshit and propaganda. We were, after all, winning the arms race against the Russians.

My 1st grade class co-taught by Mrs. Thompson and Mrs. Gunderson was apart of the process since Day 1 with building models, learning about the astronauts and visiting the plant where the Shuttle was partially built. The teachers were overwhelmingly enthused by Christa McAuliffe, the teacher chosen to ride in space as the first non-astronaut human. It meant a generation of children would know that teaching meant so much more than a classroom setting, it meant reaching the limits of space.

The explosion was something none of us could fathom. I remember being seated in a dark computer lab with my peers crying, unable to understand what happened. I think it was in the instance of the explosion that a whole generation of Americans realized how fragile we actually were. That sometimes lady luck isn’t on our side and on that day Jesus was not an American citizen.